


You Can't Take the Sky From Me

by Rangergirl3



Series: Lost Paladins [7]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Gen, Shiro (Voltron)'s Missing Year, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-04
Updated: 2016-11-04
Packaged: 2018-08-29 01:55:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8471107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rangergirl3/pseuds/Rangergirl3
Summary: Shiro has always been there for his team - even before Voltron was formed again. This is set during the first few months of the year Shiro and the Holts were captives of the Galran Empire. And of course, Serenity and Firefly are referenced (as you can tell from the title). Seeing as how Shiro is the Guardian of the Sky, I just couldn't resist. ;-)





	

Coping with insane levels of stress by closing his eyes and trying to clear his mind was probably not going to help his sanity in the long-term.

But it sure as hell was better than curling into a ball and rocking back and forth, or beginning to scream at the top of his voice and punching the walls.

He and Matt were stuck in a cell together, and it wasn't a very big cell. As far as space went, even claustrophobic was too grand a word.

Matt's head knocked against the ceiling if he tried to straighten up to his full height, and as Shiro was a full head and shoulders taller than his friend, he hadn't even bothered to try getting to his feet. Instead, Shiro had adjusted so that he was now sitting on the ground, his back against one of the shorter walls, his right leg stretched out in front of him, his left knee drawn up, near to his chin. Matt was at the opposite corner of the room, trying to make as much use of the space as they could.

Neither were thrilled at the situation at hand. As soon as the doors had shut, Matt had started to search the walls for a lever, a switch,  _something_. Shiro could understand his feelings, even wanted to help, but he didn't join in. Too much movement in here would only make the space feel even more crowded.

They'd trained for enclosed spaces. After all, the three of them - Sam, Matt, and Shiro - had been in a spaceship for over two months. But in that environment, Shiro had been a pilot, part of a team, part of a mission that had been a ground-breaking scientific feat of mankind. In here, he was just a man who couldn't get to his feet.

It was maddening. But at least Matt was here too. He wasn't alone.

Not like Sam was.

Matt was saying his name, trying to get his attention. With some difficulty, Shiro opened his eyes and raised his head. He'd been trying to visualize a larger space, to keep himself from feeling the tightness of their situation, but he couldn't just ignore Matt.

"Yeah?" he asked. He tried not to let his own edginess show in his voice. He could tell his friend was scared. Well, who wouldn't be - they'd been captured by aliens and were currently being treated as laboratory experiments. If Shiro took time to think about their situation - which he was purposefully wasn't - it would be absolutely, mind-shatteringly bad for his morale.

"Shiro," Matt was saying, "I don't see a way out. Do you think we're supposed to  _find_  a way out?"

Shiro shook his head from side to side, half-closing his eyes again. "I don't know. I'm not sure why they put the two of us in here, but it might just be to see how we react to small spaces."

Matt sighed, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "I guess so - I just wish - I wish there was a puzzle to solve, or something."

Shiro shot him a look from the corner of one eye, feeling his mouth twist into a half-smile. It felt slightly forced, but genuine all the same. "What, like a Rubix cube or something?"

Matt's face flickered with a similar, forced half-smile. "Yeah, wouldn't that be great." He waved a hand in the air, as if he were a magician pulling a rabbit from a hat. "Ta-da! Solve this puzzle and be freed!"

Shiro felt his smile become bitter, tried not to let Matt see, tried to hide it from his voice. "Yeah," he managed. "Wouldn't that be nice of them."

Matt seemed to realize his half-hearted attempt at a joke had only made the situation worse. "I'm sorry…" he said. "I just - I really hate this." He looked down at his feet. "I'm sorry," he said again. "I know it's worse for you. You're the one they - they - "

Shiro had been trying to repress the memory of another cell, much like this one, back on the Druid's ship, the one they'd taken him to when they'd first been captured - but at Matt's words, he felt his heart skip a few beats. With an effort of will, he pressed the fear back down.

He wasn't on the Druid's ship. Not anymore.

They were still on the prison ship, all three of them.

The Druids had finished with them, they'd finished with  _him_  - that's why they'd been transferred to the main prison ship in the first place.

They'd just - they'd just been moved to just another cell on the prison ship, that's all there was to it. Sure, it was small, like the Druid's cell had been, and Sam was somewhere else, but this  _had_  to be the prison ship.

They weren't back in the Druid's power. They couldn't be.

Because he wouldn't go back there again. He wouldn't. He'd rather die first.

* * *

With an effort, he brought his mind back to the situation at hand.

It had been over a month since he'd returned from the Druid's ship. Or at least it felt like it had. He should focus on what was happening  _now_. And right now, he was with Matt, and Matt was scared. He had to reassure his friend.

Shiro leaned his head back against the wall, looking up at the ceiling. It was all black, smooth tile, only a few, thin lines giving out purple light where the ceiling and the walls met. Slowly, he shook his head from side to side again, forcing back memories of the Druids as he spoke.

"No," he said. "No, Matt - it's not worse for me. It's hard on both of us. But - at least we've got each other, right? And I'm sure your dad is okay. We'll see him again soon. They always - " He felt his breath hitch in his chest, but he continued anyway, "They always put us back in the same cell as the others eventually. We'll be back with the others soon, and they'll - they'll bring your dad back, too. This is just - just temporary. "

Matt bit his lip, looked around the cell again. "I know - I just - " He stopped, then said what was really on his mind. "I just - I just wish the three of us were together. This feels - this feels different. Why would they separate us - I mean - unless it's another kind of….test…"

Shiro's shoulders tightened automatically at the word. He swallowed.

 _Test_  meant Druids. Druids meant pain.

Shiro's mind raced back to earlier in the day.

* * *

When the sentries had come to the prisoners' cell, everyone - him, Matt, Sam, the aliens who they'd joined as prisoners of the Galra - had stayed as still as possible, trying not to attract attention to any one of themselves. But then the first two sentries had grabbed Sam's arms and started taking him away, and Matt and Shiro had moved to stop them. The other prisoners remained seated, as if they'd expected or guessed something like this might happen, and knew the attempt could only end in pain.

They'd been right.

"Dad!" Matt had shouted, grabbing his father's arm, trying to force the sentry's grip loose. " _Dad_!"

Shiro hadn't said anything - he'd just come up from behind the other sentry and put it into a headlock, trying to wrench the primary circuits in its neck loose so the thing would let Sam go. But even as they'd tried to keep the two sentries from taking Sam, four others had entered the cell and grabbed hold of both Matt and Shiro, pulling them backwards, away from Sam.

Matt had kicked out frantically, trying to get free, trying to get closer to his father, who was already being led away down the hall, but without success. Sam Holt's eyes had been wide in fear, but he was shouting back to Matt that it was going to be all right, that he'd be back soon.

Shiro had snarled then, anger building in his chest. This wasn't right, this wasn't  _fair_ , they couldn't just take Sam away from his son. With an effort, he'd lashed out with his right arm, but the sentry on that side had grabbed hold of his wrist and then twisted his right arm behind his back, forcing him down onto one knee.

 _Desist_ , it had said.  _Desist._

Shiro had wanted to keep fighting, to break free and get to Sam. But the pressure on his wrist scared him. He'd felt the pain of a broken wrist before, he didn't want to feel it again, so he had stopped trying to get free, hating himself even as he did so.

Then he'd been hauled back to his feet, and he and Matt had been taken down dark corridors and unlit hallways until they'd reached this room. They'd both been shoved through the doorway, and it had sealed shut with a loud hiss behind them, disappearing seamlessly into the wall. Faint glowing lines of purple light shone above them, gleaming where the ceiling and the walls met, except in one place.

Wait.

Shiro hadn't noticed that detail before. But he did now.

There wasn't any light coming from the farthest corner of the room, up at the intersection of the two walls and the ceiling. A small but solid triangle of darkness sat there, and it drew Shiro's eye to it. The light around the cell had been so dim that this single corner of darkness almost hadn't been noticeable - at least, not until his eyes had adjusted to the faint light in the cell.

But that patch of darkness made Shiro think that Matt was right.

He remembered that the darkness was how - how - Haggar - saw - saw -

A tremor of fear ran through Shiro's belly. Matt was right not to like this. Sam's separation from them  _was_  part of a test.

"Matt," Shiro said slowly, feeling his heart begin to pound faster, "listen to me - try not to panic… but I think…I think we're being watched."

Matt turned to face him again, his skin seeming to grow paler in the already weak light. "Shiro-what are you talking abo-"

Shiro brought his head back down and looked straight at him then, and Matt's eyes went wide in fear. He swallowed, then said in a whisper, so faint that it almost didn't reach Shiro's ears, "Is it - is it  _her_?"

Shiro kept his eyes locked onto Matt's face, and he ever-so-slightly nodded his head. "Matt, look at me." He took in a deep breath, and continued. "Don't look anywhere else, okay?"

Matt's breath had begun to come faster, and his hands had begun to shake. "Why?" he asked, and his voice almost broke with fear. "Where is she -  _how_  is she-"

"To your right," Shiro said, keeping his voice low. "The corner by the ceiling. The light doesn't reach there. I think - I think she's watching us through the shadows." He took another deep breath, forcing his voice not to waver, to stay steady. "From what - from what little I remember about my time on the Druid ship, it's how they - how they watch us."

Matt took in a shaky breath, but swallowed back his fear long enough to ask, "What do we do?"

* * *

Shiro felt fear, awful, sickening, cold fear rise in his chest. He wanted to have a plan, a weapon,  _something_. But he didn't. And if it came to a fight, he wouldn't even be able to get to his feet to properly face the witch. All he could do was to keep talking to Matt, try to keep him as calm as possible.

"Stay calm," he said. "We're going to - Matt, listen, we're going to try - and - and stay calm. Let's talk about something - anything."

Matt let out a thin, horrible sound that have been a panicked laugh. "Talk about  _what_?" he asked. "I'm fresh out of ideas for light conversation - Shiro - oh God, Shiro,  _what if she can hear us_?"

Shiro had not thought of that, but, after hearing the fear in Matt's voice, he decided on what to do in a matter of seconds.

"If she  _can_  hear us," he said, and he kept his eyes fixed on Matt, trying to keep his voice steady as he raised his voice to normal volume,"-then she's going to get really,  _really_  bored-"

Matt just stared at him, his eyes still round with fear, but now he also looked confused.

Shiro continued, forcing himself to smile at his friend. "- because I'm just going to keep referencing movies and shows that she has never seen - okay, Matt?"

"Uh—what?"

Matt's expression was torn between a soul-draining fear of the witch and a growing certainty that his friend had just lost his mind.

"Listen, Matt," Shiro said, "I'll say a quote, and you say the next one, okay?"

Matt blinked, obviously now convinced that his friend's mind had finally snapped.

Shiro just decided to go with it. After all, their situation could  _literally_  not get any worse.

"We're not going to die, Bendis. We can't die. You know why?"

Shiro saw his friend's expression flicker, and suddenly there was the trace of a smile on his face. Matt answered him in a shaky but recognizable imitation of a Southern drawl. "Because - because we are so  _very_  pretty..?"

Shiro felt a chuckle bubble up in his throat as they finished the line from  _Firefly_  together.

"- We are just too damn pretty for God to let us die."

"Why  _was_  there only one season?" Matt asked, a little color coming back into his face. Shiro shrugged, glad he'd helped his friend push back the fear of their situtation, if only for a moment.

"One of the great mysteries of the 'verse," he said, intentionally using the abbreviation the show made such good use of. "Well, that and politics."

He grinned as Matt laughed then. It was a shaky, small sound, but it was good to hear.

Oh, Shiro knew he was stalling. He was  _definitely, absolutely_  stalling from dealing with the knowledge that they were being watched by one of the most evil, malicious beings he had ever encountered. She was cold, calculating, and cruel, and if she realized Shiro's defiance, she would take great pleasure in unmaking him.

But he wouldn't break so easily. He would fight her every step of the way. In the end, his soul was his own.

She couldn't take the sky from him.

Matt grinned over at Shiro then. He was keeping his eyes away from the spot of darkness, but his left hand gestured slightly towards it, and then he continued the game.

"Don't think it's a good spot, sir. She still has the advantage over us."

Shiro grinned back at Matt then, feeling something bright flicker inside his chest. He liked this next character. He answered - but instead of trying a Southern accent, he just made his voice sound confident, like the captain's had.

"Everyone always does. That's what makes us  _special_."

Matt opened his mouth again, about to continue the game, but suddenly there was a short, sharp buzzing sound that echoed throughout the room, like a sound system coming online.

Shiro felt his mouth go dry, and he could only hope the sound was in his imagination.

It wasn't.

* * *

The buzzing sound ended, and suddenly they could hear Sam's voice, as if from over an intercom. He sounded terrified.

"No, no, that's impossible - I couldn't-"

Then another voice, raspy, hoarse. The witch.

" _You must. There is no alternative."_

Shiro's first instinct was to jump to his feet, to grab for something,  _anything_  that could serve as a weapon. But there just wasn't any room.

Hell with it. He wasn't going to die sitting down. He got quickly to his feet, bending his knees so that he didn't reach his full height. He came to stand by Matt, pressing one hand up against the ceiling, trying to look around, to get some indication of where the witch was.

Matt had jumped in shock at the sound of his father's voice, and then he'd fallen still again, looking into every corner of the room.

"Dad?" he asked, and there was a sudden pause. Then Sam's voice came again, crackling over the system.

"Matt? Matt, can you hear me?!"

"DAD!" Matt shouted. "Are you okay - where are you -"

"I'm here, on the other side of the wall - can't you see me -" A frantic thump sounded on the left wall of the room, as if someone was pounding a fist against soundproof glass.

Shiro whipped his head towards the wall on his left side. It was one of the wider panels, and if Sam were standing behind it, maybe he could see into their cell from his side. If that was the case, he could see each of them clearly as they stood side by side in this room. But why-

Matt made as if to rush forward, probably to try and break through to where his father was, but suddenly he cried out in pained astonishment. Something - it looked like black vines - had come out of the wall behind him and had twined themselves around his knees, his torso, his arms - and then the vines pulled him back against the far wall, and he couldn't get free.

Even as Shiro reached out to rip the vines off Matt, he felt something twining about his legs. Feeling a sudden, horrible, draining kind of fear, he looked down just in time to see identical black vines curling around his ankles, his knees, his torso - and then he was pulled back down to the floor, forced into a kneeling position. He snarled in frustration and tried again to reach towards Matt, to help pull his friend free from the vines, but Matt was staring behind him, horror etched across his features.

"Shiro!" Matt screamed. "Behind you!"

Then more vines were reaching out from behind Shiro's head, grabbing hold of his shoulders, his arms, his wrists, and no matter how much he tried to to break free, soon they had pulled his arms back and behind him. He felt more vines wrap around his wrists, securing his arms behind his back. He tried to get up, to stand up, to do  _something_ , but he couldn't move. The vines had no give, no sway, no slack he could take advantage of. They felt more like wires or ropes than vines.

Now they were both trapped, Matt secured against the wall, wrapped in vines from his shoulders to his ankles, and Shiro on his knees, only a few feet away from Matt. Both of them faced the wall where the thump had sounded from, faced where Sam Holt might be standing.

"DAD!" Matt shouted again, face pale, eyes large. He was trying to break free of the vines, but it was useless. They were woven too tightly around him. "DAD!"

Sam's voice came again, and it was strained, pleading. "Please," he said. "Please -  _please_  - just let them go-"

Then the witch's voice came again, and it was just as cruel as when Shiro had last heard it aboard her ship. He felt his spine prickle with remembered fear at the sound.

" _Choose, Samuel Holt,"_  she said.  _"Choose who shall live, and who shall die."_

The reply was broken, almost inaudible. "I - I  _can't_  -"

Shiro felt something deep inside his heart twist in sudden understanding, and it almost caused him physical pain.

 _This_  was her test. She was testing Samuel's will, his loyalty to his team. This was just like her - it was malicious, cold, and cruel - and Shiro knew it could only have one outcome.

Matt had stopped struggling and shouting for his father. He turned his head to look over at Shiro at the same instant Shiro looked up at him. Matt's face had drained of all color, and he looked as if he were about to be sick.

Sam's voice came again, and the pain in his voice was agony to listen to. "Please," he was saying. "I couldn't - I  _couldn't_  possibly choose - please,  _please_  just let them go - "

Haggar hissed then, an almost poisonous sound of anger and impatience. Shiro couldn't hold back a cry of pain as the vines around his chest tightened viciously, cutting into his flesh, drawing blood. Dimly, he heard Matt cry out too, followed by another cry of fear and despair from Sam.

Hearing his friends' cries of fear snapped something inside Shiro's heart. Rage boiled in his chest, and he raised his eyes to glare at the wall, at the witch he could not see. He bared his teeth, and he felt his eyes narrow.

"Leave - them - alone," he spat. "Just - "

The vines around his wrists suddenly tightened - there was a sudden, awful pressure - then the vines twisted once, sharply. There was a horrible snapping sound, immediately followed by a second. An instant later, pounding, hot, jagged pain radiated from each of his wrists, down through his fingers and up through both of his arms.

His wrists had been broken, snapped as easily as if the bones had been dry twigs. He could feel bones poking out of his skin, and then, an instant later, he heard his blood begin to drip onto the floor.

He  _tried_  to keep his teeth clenched, to only hiss as the pain came, but then a scream of absolute agony tore itself from his throat, and then another, and another. If he had been able to move, he would have fallen onto the ground. But he was held in place by the vines, and he could not move, nor take any pressure off of his injuries.

The effort to scream soon became too much - his vision blurred and his breaths began to come short and harsh, his throat completely raw, and he now only dimly heard Matt's yells of rage. Everything was tinged with red and black, fading in and out of focus, and Shiro wished he could pass out. Anything, anything to get away from this pain.

"NO!" Sam was screaming. To Shiro, it seemed to come from a long way off. "NO, don't hurt them!"

"Shiro?" Matt was crying now. His face was streaked with tears. " _Shiro_  - "

It took Shiro what seemed forever to get enough breath back to answer. The pain was almost its own entity now, burning, biting, tearing at the injuries, at his mind, but he had to answer Matt. He had to.

" S-okay - " he managed. "S-okay - Matt -"

"Please," Sam was begging Haggar, "Please, take me, let them go, let them both go-"

Haggar spoke once more.  _"Choose, Samuel Holt. Or they both die."_

Another tightening of the vines around his chest, but Shiro felt that pain only distantly this time. He did feel the blood start to drip down from the deeper cuts on his shoulders, and he thought he heard Matt gasp once more, and then Sam was crying. He was crying, and he was saying he would choose.

Then Sam said a name, and his voice broke as he did.

" _I thought so,"_ the witch purred.

"NO!" Matt was screaming now, trying not to listen, trying to deny what had just happened.

Shiro swallowed then, biting back another scream of pain with an effort. His teeth ground together with the effort, and he felt sick, cold, small, and very, very afraid. His heart pounded loudly in his ears, and all other noises seemed to fade away for an instant.

He desperately wanted to live, to survive. But he tried not to show the fear flooding through him, and instead tried to raise his head long enough to lock gazes with Matt.

Matt would blame himself, but Shiro wanted him to know it was okay. It  _was_.

Shiro understood why Sam had chosen to save Matt. Matt was Sam's only son. He understood _._

"Matt - s-okay," Shiro said, gasping out the words, past the pain and the fear he felt pounding in his chest. "- s'okay- I -"

He felt something loop over his head and then swiftly tighten around his neck, and he only had time to lock eyes with Matt for a second before his head was jerked viciously back and up. One of the vines had come creeping down from the ceiling and looped around his neck like a hangman's noose, and then it had pulled tight, completely cutting off his air.

Matt screamed then, a horrible, desperate sound, and tried to break free, to reach out towards Shiro, to do  _something,_ but it was too late.

The pain. The pain was horrible.

Haggar was laughing somewhere, and Matt was screaming, and Sam was crying, apologizing, but Shiro couldn't hear the words. He was trying to breathe, trying to  _live,_ and nothing else mattered.

He tried to break free, more out of desperation then from an actual hope of escape, but it was useless. Finally he felt himself begin to loose consciousness, felt everything and everyone begin to drift away. He began to fall into a deep, deep dark, into the promise of quiet, of relief, of peace.

Just as he felt something in his neck begin to snap, the horrible, crushing pressure on his throat loosened. He felt the vine's hold grow slack, and then suddenly it slithered away from his neck, allowing his head to fall forward, onto his chest.

He gasped in air, feeling a sudden onrush of pain. His head hurt, it hurt worse than it ever had in his life, and every muscle in his body felt as if it were on fire.  _Everything_  hurt, and noise suddenly engulfed him, the sounds deafening, as agonizing as nails driven into his skull. He felt the light spear into his eyes when he tried to open them, and his throat felt as if it were on fire. He managed to cough, and tried again to get air back into his lungs. What had happened - why -

Then the witch was standing right in front of him - no, she was crouching down, meeting his eyes as he tried to lift his head. He flinched away from her, but she gripped his chin in one hand and forced it up, forced his eyes to meet hers.

" _You have a strong spirit,"_ she hissed. " _It would be a shame to waste it on such a easy experiment."_

Shiro wanted to spit in her face, wanted to tell her to go to Hell. But he could only glare up into her cold yellow eyes, because she held his face in such a way so that he couldn't open his jaw.

And anyway, after that pleasant little garroting, he wasn't sure if his vocal chords would ever work properly again. But his eyes said what his voice could not.

She saw his defiance, and she smiled. " _That's what I thought,"_ she said. " _But_   _I will make you into my champion yet."_ She took her hand away and watched as his head sagged forward again.

He'd been near death, there at the very end. But something told her he would make a great warrior one day. And after all, it would be no task, no task at all to kill him if he ever became a problem.

The Druid rose to her feet then, robes swirling around her as she left the room without looking back. " _Take him to the healers before you return him to his cell,"_ she said to the guards nearby. " _I want him able to fight, and soon."_

Then there were other noises around him, all of them loud, almost violent, and it took Shiro a minute to realize that guards were pulling him free from the vines. He tried to look around him, and saw that one of the walls had been taken down, and the room was now much, much larger. Matt was already being led to a far door, two sentries holding either arm, and he was calling out Shiro's name, trying to get to him.

Shiro wanted to answer, even opened his mouth to try, but then one of the guards behind him closed its hand around one of his broken wrists and tried to pull him to his feet. Shiro screamed then, an awful, barely audible sound. He felt his throat tear and tasted blood as it come up. He gagged on the coppery taste, feeling his senses dim, his mind beginning to fade away again.

The guard - a Galra solider, not a mechanical sentry - snarled in disgust. "Quit whining," he said. "Let's go." But Shiro had already slumped forward, almost completely senseless. The guard made another disgusted sound in his throat. He tried to pull Shiro upright by the arm again, and when the human screamed again - even fainter this time - he raised a foot to kick it in the ribs. Just then his commanding officer stepped forward and struck the guard across the side of the face. As the guard reeled backwards, the officer caught the human by the shoulders just before it hit the ground.

"You  _idiot_ ," Thace said, "you're making it worse. She said she wanted him able to  _fight_  - I assume she meant sometime this  _year_. Get a stretcher or something, but stop tearing his wrists apart with your foolish incompetence."

Distantly, Shiro thought that wasn't really comforting, but then everything was … fading…

He didn't know how long he stayed in that white, noiseless place his mind went to after that, but he wished he could have stayed there longer. Nothing hurt while he was there.

* * *

When he awoke, he was back in the cell they'd been in that morning. He was lying on his back in a far corner of the room, the farthest one away from the door. Shapes crowded around him, some of them whispering, some of them making gestures for the others to be silent.

Sam and Matt were nearest to him, and when Shiro opened his eyes, Matt let out a sob and grabbed hold of his father's shoulder.

"He's alive," he said. "Oh, God, Dad - he's alive-"

"Shiro," Sam was saying, his voice almost a whisper, his eyes full of tears. "Oh, Shiro - please, please understand - please - I offered to take your place, but the witch-"

Shiro wanted to say that he did understand, that it was okay, but when he tried to talk, his voice only came out as a low, guttural sound. Matt made a frantic 'nixing' motion with his hands. "No, no, don't say anything right now," he said. "Your throat's still - still pretty bad." He swallowed, his eyes miserable. Sam's gaze fell to the ground. He seemed unable to look into Shiro's face for more than a few seconds.

Shiro raised his right hand to his neck and felt - bandages? They encircled his entire neck. And there was something else, too, underneath the bandages - something that felt like a collar. It pulsed warm against his skin.

Whatever it was, it seemed to be healing the damage done to his throat. Two similar glowing devices were wrapped around his wrists, almost like gauntlets. He stared at them in confusion. He didn't remember anyone putting those on. Then again, he'd been out for - how long?

"They only brought you back about half an hour ago," Matt said. He seemed to guess what Shiro was thinking.

"We didn't know where they'd taken you at first," Sam said. "We thought…maybe…"

"But apparently they fixed your wrists - and the damage to your throat - " Matt cut him off, obviously trying to keep Shiro's mind off of anything remotely troubling. "Anyway, it looks like you're going to be okay - I mean, not right away, but - eventually - "

Shiro saw that under the - medical gauntlets - (it was as good a name as any) - that both his wrists were - well, for starters, the bones were under the skin, like they were supposed to be. And although his wrists ached awfully, the mind-numbing agony was gone. It was as if several months worth of healing had occurred in only a couple of hours, and even now, the devices were continuing to restore his bones, tendons, and veins to their normal, healthy state.

Well, he'd take improvement wherever he could find it. Slowly, he sat up, and Matt helped him keep his balance. Shiro gave him a grateful nod, but then reached out towards Sam.

When his hand touched Sam's shoulder, the older man started as if Shiro had slapped him. His eyes met Shiro's for an instant, and Shiro knew he had to try and make himself understood,  _now,_ damaged throat or not. He didn't want Sam to blame himself for this, or for Matt to think he held Sam responsible. It had been the witch's fault, and only hers. He had to let them know that.

"S-okay," he managed. It felt like his throat was on fire, but he made himself say it again. "S-okay, Sam."

He didn't know what else to do after that. He awkwardly patted Sam's shoulder again.

Matt swallowed, then reached over and pulled them both into a hug, being careful not to aggravate Shiro's injuries. "I'm so glad you're both okay," he said. His voice was thick, and hard to make out. "I was so scared."

Shiro felt Sam let out a sob and return the hug. They stayed like that for a moment, the three of them together.

Shiro felt his own eyes start to blur and tapped out of the hug. He didn't think it would be a wise idea to cry with his throat like this.

Matt seemed to guess what Shiro was thinking again, and searched for something to change the topic of conversation.

"Hey," he said, wiping something from his eye as they all sat back. "Shiro, your idea - back in the cell - it was a good one."

"Hmm?" Sam asked, inquisitive. "What was that?"

Matt told him. Sam threw back his head and laughed. It was a shaky laugh, still raw from the day's events, but genuine all the same.

"Marvelous," he said. "Once Shiro recovers, we'll have to do it more often."

Then one of the other prisoners nearby asked what - exactly - Shiro's idea had entailed, because it seemed to be interesting, and Matt explained it to them. All of the other prisoners seemed interested, if slightly confused.

"This - what did you call it?" one of them asked.

"Series," Matt said. "A - kind of - uh, entertainment."

"Ah," the alien said, nodding. "It sounds - quite good."

Matt threw his hands open wide. "It's AMAZING," he said. "Was way,  _way_  ahead of its time. There was even a movie! Want me to tell you more about it?!"

The other prisoners looked at each other, then nodded in mutual agreement. They came in a little bit closer, huddling around Matt in a rough circle.

Shiro watched Matt begin to tell them all about the ship and the crew, and he felt himself drifting off to sleep again. He settled onto his back again in the far corner, deciding that there were worse things to fall asleep to. Sam, still sitting close by, looked over at him and patted his shoulder in a friendly manner.

"Don't worry," he said, and his voice was pitched low, so he wouldn't interrupt Matt's storytelling. A smile crossed his face, and although it was small and fragile, it was a genuine expression. "We'll all be here when you wake up."

Shiro was impressed. So, Sam had seen the show too. He gave Sam a quizzical look, wanting to know more, but unable to ask the question.

"Oh, that was how my wife and I met," Sam said. "I'd sat down next to her in the cafeteria, back at school, and she and I started talking about what we liked, and that show came up. I asked if she'd like to see it with me, and she said yes." He paused for a moment, remembering. A happy smile crossed his face for a moment.

"That was the first date my wife and I went on," he said. He looked back down at Shiro, patted his shoulder again, and smiled again. It was a stronger, firmer expression this time. "Rest," he said. "You've had a long day."

The last thing Shiro thought before drifting off to sleep was that he thought Keith might have liked to help Matt tell the story to the others. 

But at least Keith wasn't here. He was safe, back on Earth.

For now.

**Author's Note:**

> This was written halfway through the series, so it's included here in the middle because...timing...and because one of the best shows (and movie) in the 'verse is timeless enough to be referenced in any story set in space.


End file.
